122 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 
large quantities is obtained from the trunks by splitting 
them open, scraping out the cellular portion and extracting 
the starch by washing. A very strong, black, stiff, horse- 
hair-like fibre from the base of the leaf stalk is used for 
cordage, ropes and-brushes. The tree dies after flowering. 
The Romanzoff palm (Cocos Romanzoffiana) is the larger 
of the two Pe measuring forty-five feet from the base 
of the trunk to the tip of the leaves. The trunk itself is 
thirty feet in height and one foot, three inches in diameter. 
Owing to the brittleness of this long trunk, it is necessary 
to support it with heavy timbers, which will be left on the 
plant until it has entirely recovered from any check received 
during removal. 
Both plants arrived at the Garden without having received 
the sli test injury, and since it was less than twenty-four 
hours from the time the palms were removed from Brown- 
hurst until they were permanently # eo in the new palm 
— * the Garden, it is believed they will suffer no serious 
set-back. 
A BOTANICAL SURVEY OF THE SOUTHWEST. 
The conspicuous economic development of the Southwest 
is rapidly changing the character of the natural conditions 
in this part of the United States. The growing number 
of irrigation projects, the construction of levee and dike for 
the reclamation of arid and littoral lands result in the 
gradual giving way of the native vegetation to vast planta- 
tions, rice fields, truck patches and fruit farms, thus pro- 
moting enormously the agricultural interests, but at the 
same time permanently replacing the indigenous flora by | 
cultivated plants. Accompanying these changes there is 
naturally a rapidly growing population and an increasing 
sonar for a concise and reliable flora of the region con- 
cerned. 
At the present time there is no publication which is suf- 
ficiently comprehensive to cover completely the entire South- 
west; although certain parts of the region are either already ~ 
provided with a working manual or at least have one in the 
course of publication, as for example, Coulter’s Flora of 
Western Texas, and forthcoming floras of New Mexieo and 
Arizona amply provide for the more arid and distinctly 
mountainous parts of the Southwest. Again, Dr. Small’s 
admirable Flora of the Southeastern United States is of in- 
estimable value in studying our Southern flora, but as the 
title indicates it is concerned primarily with the Southeastern 
states, treating in detail the montane flora of the southern 
